Noemie Thomas is only five feet, four inches — with her shoes on — but she swims tall.

This 16-year-old from Richmond, B.C., just broke the Canadian record in the women’s 50-metre butterfly at short-course world championships in Istanbul.

“In swimming and in other sports, there are general rules about how tall you should be but there still are exceptions,” Thomas said after her record-breaking time of 25.76 seconds in Thursday’s semifinal heats.

So far, she’s proving to be one of those exceptions. In breaking the three-year-old national record, Thomas bettered by almost a quarter of a second her personal-best time set just a month ago at the Canada Cup in Toronto. She qualified fourth for Friday’s final.

In sprint butterfly, her competitors are often in the six-foot range.

“Lining up behind the blocks, I’m usually looking at people’s shoulders,” she said.

Johnson was also impressed with Thomas’s maturity and ability to handle the pressure of a big event, given she only started training at the national swim centre in September.

Thomas only decided to focus on swimming full-time a few years ago. Before that, she was a serious ballerina and only swam in the summers. For a chance to be really competitive, though, she had to make a choice about which one to continue with.

“It was a hard decision, but I decided for swimming,” Thomas said. “It seems to be working out pretty well for me.”